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Thursday night, this guy wandered into the store right around closing. Youngish guy with a bad Jeff Spicoli haircut. I began schmoozing him and he gave me the brush-off: "I'm just killing time, I'm not going to buy anything."
"Okay, then I won't bother you," I said with a big broad phoney smile – asshole! – and started folding teeshirts.
He stays in the store for the longest time, picking up bottles, staring at labels, putting them down again. If you're not going to buy anything, get the fuck out of the store! I felt like screaming. I didn't like the guy, he was arrogant.
Then he wanders over to the locked glass counter, points at The Source – the world's hottest affordable hot sauce – and says, "What's that?"
I am standing there with my pricing gun, at work on three cartons of hot sauce so I just smile and shake my head.
"What is it?" he demands again.
"Look," I say. "You already told me you're not going to buy anything. And I'm doing something else here. So I'd really rather not get into a conversation."
He scowls at me. "That's really rude."
"Is it?" I ask. "I suppose it is. But really if you're looking for entertainment, you could always buy a ticket to Pirates of the Caribbean."
Oh, he's working those eyebrows and that lower lip now. "Where's your boss?" he asks.
"Out there," I say, waving at the imperturbable Rainer who is outside watering my habanero plants which have just begun to sprout baby chili peppers.
Surfer guy goes outside, confronts Rainer and begins telling him that I have a Bad Attitude – the retail equivalent of Bad Breath In Dogs – that I should be fired immediately, that he had been prepared to lay down the Big Buck$ on a bottle of hot sauce but now he would never darken our doorway again – la la la!
Rainer just stared at him in befuddlement.
"What was all that about?" he asked when he wandered back into the store.
"Just some asshole," I said.
But I was on pins and needles. I had insulted a potential customer! Oh, the Gods of Retail were really gonna make me suffer!
Except sales have been quite reasonable since then. Not great – Big Japanese motorcycle races in town, the Red Bull U.S. Grand Prix and traditionally this has never been a good weekend for us even though they close Cannery Row on Saturday night and there are literally thousands of people milling about.
People who are into Japanese motorcycles like to come down to Cannery Row to dress up in weird Power Ranger costumes, get drunk, hook up and run around looking at Japanese motorcycles. They don't like to come down to buy hot sauce.
Still, we've been doing considerably better this year than we've done on Power Ranger Weekend the three years past. So either the Gods of Retail don't exist or Jeff Spicoli wasn't one of their chosen people.
What a week. Computer connectivity problems; deliveries – 800 bottles of hot sauce that needed to be unpacked and un-foam-peanuted; plus an omnipresent sense of isolation and malaise. Two steps forward, 1.999 steps back: every day brings new fires, fires that need to be put out, and manning that hose and ladder takes up a lot of time. It's hard to keep that momentum going on the Future-Projects-That-Once-They're-Done-Your-Life-Will-Be-Perfect list.
"Okay, then I won't bother you," I said with a big broad phoney smile – asshole! – and started folding teeshirts.
He stays in the store for the longest time, picking up bottles, staring at labels, putting them down again. If you're not going to buy anything, get the fuck out of the store! I felt like screaming. I didn't like the guy, he was arrogant.
Then he wanders over to the locked glass counter, points at The Source – the world's hottest affordable hot sauce – and says, "What's that?"
I am standing there with my pricing gun, at work on three cartons of hot sauce so I just smile and shake my head.
"What is it?" he demands again.
"Look," I say. "You already told me you're not going to buy anything. And I'm doing something else here. So I'd really rather not get into a conversation."
He scowls at me. "That's really rude."
"Is it?" I ask. "I suppose it is. But really if you're looking for entertainment, you could always buy a ticket to Pirates of the Caribbean."
Oh, he's working those eyebrows and that lower lip now. "Where's your boss?" he asks.
"Out there," I say, waving at the imperturbable Rainer who is outside watering my habanero plants which have just begun to sprout baby chili peppers.
Surfer guy goes outside, confronts Rainer and begins telling him that I have a Bad Attitude – the retail equivalent of Bad Breath In Dogs – that I should be fired immediately, that he had been prepared to lay down the Big Buck$ on a bottle of hot sauce but now he would never darken our doorway again – la la la!
Rainer just stared at him in befuddlement.
"What was all that about?" he asked when he wandered back into the store.
"Just some asshole," I said.
But I was on pins and needles. I had insulted a potential customer! Oh, the Gods of Retail were really gonna make me suffer!
Except sales have been quite reasonable since then. Not great – Big Japanese motorcycle races in town, the Red Bull U.S. Grand Prix and traditionally this has never been a good weekend for us even though they close Cannery Row on Saturday night and there are literally thousands of people milling about.
People who are into Japanese motorcycles like to come down to Cannery Row to dress up in weird Power Ranger costumes, get drunk, hook up and run around looking at Japanese motorcycles. They don't like to come down to buy hot sauce.
Still, we've been doing considerably better this year than we've done on Power Ranger Weekend the three years past. So either the Gods of Retail don't exist or Jeff Spicoli wasn't one of their chosen people.
What a week. Computer connectivity problems; deliveries – 800 bottles of hot sauce that needed to be unpacked and un-foam-peanuted; plus an omnipresent sense of isolation and malaise. Two steps forward, 1.999 steps back: every day brings new fires, fires that need to be put out, and manning that hose and ladder takes up a lot of time. It's hard to keep that momentum going on the Future-Projects-That-Once-They're-Done-Your-Life-Will-Be-Perfect list.
